


Clean Hands

by Oparu



Category: Star Trek: Voyager
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-11
Updated: 2011-07-11
Packaged: 2017-10-21 06:38:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/222038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Oparu/pseuds/Oparu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Workforce AU. Kashyk visits Quarra and finds Kathryn not as he left her. He seeks her ship and Chakotay in order to bring her back to herself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Clean Hands

**Author's Note:**

> for Quantumsilver, who needs more J/Ka and C/Ka in her life.

As soon as she speaks, she's wrong. He wants her to be right, to be Kathryn Janeway, the woman who tricked him and used him to lie to herself. The voice is right, but it's too fresh, too cheerful somehow to be her. She smiled at him across a table and introduced him to her lover without a moment's pause or thought.

Kathryn didn't reach for his knee while she told him how much she loves this Jaffen. She didn't smirk and coyly explain how long they'd been together. There's no fire in this Kathryn and it bores him. It stings to even consider the thought, but she bores him. She's too content and it disgusts him. Kashyk saw her across the room, picked her out of the crowd and zeroed in with his trousers already tightening at the promise of her--

And she bores him. She's chatting away about her new job and the likelihood that he'll find work and he just wants to get away. He listens for information's sake, drowning his disappointment in cheap liquor and the smell of the bar. Everywhere outside the Imperium is so dirty it intrigues him. He needs his daily bathing ritual, while on his vessel it was simply a formality. Here he'll wash off grit and dust and watch it leave his skin bare and perfect.

He walks dark alleys until he finds a woman willing to spread her legs against the wall. She's a redhead with curls too bright to be real, but she says nothing, doesn't even moan his name when he pays her extra not too. If only he could pay her to glare at him with angry eyes and fight back as if she were fighting her own demons through him. She does the job and he pays her extra. It's not her fault she's not Kathryn, and unlike the empty shell in there, the whore is honest.

Kashyk returns to his hotel room and washes the sweat and dirt from his skin, closing his eyes in the deep bath and remembering the feel of Kathryn on the glass table, liquid heat against the cold. His penis is rigid and demanding when the bath is done and he finishes himself lazily, fantasising of taking Kathryn in that sleazy little bar and fucking her on the metal table in front of her lover until her eyes blaze with hate and she's herself again.

He dresses carefully and pays for the room in the morning. He'll have to find her ship, of course, and get her out of this dull grey dream state. Kathryn Janeway does not talk about moving in with her lover and having dinner parties. It's a mockery of her essence, a taming of a force that should be wild and half-mad from the ecstasies of the universe. Kathryn should be teetering on the edge of sanity because that's what makes her bright, brilliant even, like a star: ever collapsing, ever burning. She's timeless. This, well, this is a joke.

Kashyk prefers to be the one who owns the joke, not the one who realises how terribly unamusing this one seems to be. Why is it always up to him to right the universe?  


* * *

Of course, it's the tattooed monkey who still has the ship. He has a few of Kathryn's people, but he's still on her ship. Kashyk can still smell her as she's supposed to be. Chakotay, the minion, listens to him and finally starts to believe him once he has him back over the desk. He's been hurting, crew gone, Kathryn gone and Chakotay doesn't even know how to get her back. They trade insults and looks, pressing up against each other until both of them are fighting arousal and the ready room has the hard edge of sweat in the air.

Chakotay takes him back to his quarters and fucks him against the wall. He's more of an equal, more intriguing, and they plot, lying in bed together. Chakotay's sweat dries on Kashyk's skin. He washes it off in the sonic shower but returns to the overly comfortable Starfleet bed naked. They'll bring Kathryn back. Chakotay already had half a plan and Kashyk's non-Starfleet, he's a better infiltrator than anyone and the best liar he's ever run into.

The jabbering hologram turns Chakotay Devore, an ironic twist that flies in the face of so much of his life that Kashyk laughs at the absurdity of a human pretending to be Devore. It's a glorious farce and the mask makes Chakotay that much more attractive. There's no time, of course, but Kashyk insists they cast themselves as lovers instead of friends.

Down on the planet of lies and dust, Kashyk delights in holding Chakotay's hand. He's never indulged in the concept, Devore don't waste time on unnecessary acts of affection, but the species around them do. It's like falling into a strange sort of dream world, where Chakotay orders his drinks and they talk to Kathryn about everything but what's important. It's lies within lies but only Chakotay and Kashyk know what they're saying. Jaffen only has truth and Kashyk would pity him if he had time for the emotion. He doesn't, but that fancy, like holding hands on top of the table, fascinates him.

It's a brief experience, sharing a small apartment with the tattooed man dressed as Devore. It's quaint and calm, Chakotay's more of a fighter than Prax. In spite of his better judgement, this is a more interesting diversion than most. This time he lets Chakotay fuck him, letting the dirt of him, his sweat and his seed inside of him. He even sleeps that way, filthy with sweat and scratches against cheap sheets.

He feels like he's never been clean in the morning but he only has enough time for a single scrub which is inadequate but he's slightly cleaner.

They infiltrate and fast talk and Chakotay's plan turns out better than they hoped. It ends messily, with phaser marks on the walls and Kathryn's ship screaming out of orbit. She's back, at least in body. Kashyk stays a day, watching the soft little crew pull themselves back together. Kathryn looks through him, seeing Jaffen, the soft man who really believed that he'd stumbled into a perfect life.

Kashyk knows better, but he knows better than most.  


* * *

Her quarters are dark, but instead of fighting it, she lets it in. She's all but consumed. She's not just lying now, the fights gone out of her. He toys with bringing it back but when he pushes her up against the wall she lets him. He kisses her then, soft, almost human.

She'll be back, after time but he needs to move on. Healing isn't something he sticks around for, too soft. Kathryn has tears on her face and he doesn't indulge such things. He kisses her again, running his teeth over her lip. She pushes back just a little. She'll be back. Maybe he'll even point his shuttle in that direction, just to see her again when she's herself.

He'd love to have her slap him with fire in her eyes but for now, he walks away. Someday she'll hate him again, adding this experience to the fire within her. It's that Kathryn he wants and he'll get her. He always does.


End file.
